Sazerac Hires 1,000th Employee

July 31, 2013

The Sazerac Company, one of the largest family-owned distilling companies in the United States, has just added the 1,000th employee to its operations in Kentucky, which include the Buffalo Trace Distillery in Franklin County, Barton 1792 Distillery in Bardstown, The Glenmore Distillery in Owensboro, and Sazerac headquarters in Louisville.

In 1992, the Sazerac Company bought Buffalo Trace Distillery, which had suffered a decline in business along with the rest of the bourbon industry. At that time, Buffalo Trace employed only 50 individuals, down from 1,000 following World War II.

Since 1992, Sazerac has made significant progress rebuilding Buffalo Trace Distillery, which now employs 406. Sazerac also acquired other Kentucky assets, The Glenmore and Barton 1792 Distilleries from Constellation Brands in 2009, and established a headquarters for Sazerac in Louisville, also in 2009, while also increasing employment at each location.

Today, the company reports that business is growing at all four Sazerac locations in Kentucky, with distilled spirits production, bottling, distribution, and tourism key to the organization's growth. In fact, Kentucky has become a hub for the distilled spirits industry, accounting for 47 percent of all distilled spirits bottled in the United States.

"The long term economic potential of the distilled spirits industry for Kentucky and bourbon in particular is substantial," said Mark Brown, Sazerac president and chief executive officer, "In order to realize this potential we continue to call on state and federal legislators to remove punitive and discriminatory taxes on the Kentucky Bourbon industry, specifically the 'barrel tax' which does not apply to other spirits like vodka, gin, or rum, and the federal capitalized interest tax on bourbon makers," Brown applauds Congressman Andy Barr for introducing the Aged Distilled Spirits Competitiveness Act, which would help level the playing field for Kentucky's signature bourbon industry. "Swift action on these critical issues will help speed further creation of good paying, steady jobs for Kentucky citizens," stated Brown.

Since 2009, Sazerac has created 250 good paying, reliable jobs. "In a very difficult economy, it has been nice to bring our Kentucky job total to over 1,000 employees in the past 15 years," added Brown.